


I will carry you, always

by KHart



Series: let 'em wonder how we got this far, 'cause I don't really need to wonder at all [2]
Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: F/F, Multi, That's it, hello, just fluff, sleepy and in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-27 18:36:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16707865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KHart/pseuds/KHart
Summary: "No one else stays awake until we fall asleep and carries us to bed when we forget to make it there."--Or: a one-shot expansion on Charlotte carrying her girls to bed when they fall asleep in the wrong place.





	I will carry you, always

**Author's Note:**

> The title of the fic is from the song "Carry You" by Novo Amor. 
> 
> My Tumblr is Flairfatale.

What Charlotte hated most about press days was how truly  _long_  they could be. How truly exhausting they could be, despite her love of meeting new people and fans.

Because she could be up at 6 A.M. some days and not get back to whatever bed she was to sleep in—her own, a hotel bed, her girlfriends’ hotel bed—until 11 P.M., or midnight, even.

She could start doing interviews in the morning, speaking appearances in the afternoon, charity events in the evening, and never really have a moment of rest.  

And it was really just a lot, at times. 

What made it worse was when it was a press  _weekend_ , because, usually, those long weekend days happened to be off days that her girlfriends had. So then she had to disentangle herself from their warm and sleeping bodies at the crack of dawn, slip out of the apartment or hotel room without waking them, and then not be back in time to spend any real moments with them or say any real words to them.

It was those days—those weekends—that were the worst. They sucked the most. 

They’ve all been through them before. They’ve all had the long days and late nights, and, for Charlotte, today was one of those days. Today was part of one of those weekends.

She’s been up and on her feet since 5:30 A.M., just like the day before, and now it’s reaching 11:50 P.M. and they’ve all got another early start time in the morning. Charlotte knows, as she enters their shared apartment, that they’re already asleep by the way the silence creeps from under the door. (When they’re awake, there’s almost always the noise of the television and their banter.)

She tiptoes inside to see that the lamps in the living room are still on, but their metaphorical lights are out. She smiles instinctively, through her exhaustion, at the sight of the three of them curled up on the couch. She feels her endearment swell up in her chest. 

They had obviously meant to wait up for her, but sometimes their schedules really did catch up to them and they went to bed at relatively normal times, when it was allowed. 

It’s entirely understandable, a little expected, and Charlotte even knows how it probably went.

They had probably settled down to watch a movie and cuddled up close to one another. (About fifteen to twenty minutes was definitely dedicated to arguing over what to watch, and Bayley’s pick probably won out just because she was not afraid to use her eyes to weaken their resolves.)

An hour might have passed after the decision—maybe thirty minutes depending on how tired they truly were—and then Bayley, ironically, would’ve been the first one to start to lose her focus, with her head resting on Becky’s chest, like she is now. Eventually, she would’ve been mumbling for them to just wake her up when Charlotte got home. 

And Becky would’ve said “okay” with a gentle smile and her hand stroking through Bayley’s hair, but with the warmth and pressure of Bayley’s weight on her and Sasha still pressed to her side, she probably didn’t take long to drift off too. 

Sasha, naturally, is the most stubborn out of all of them—maybe aside from Charlotte herself—so she probably held out for at least another thirty minutes, but watching the movie alone and hearing Bayley and Becky’s steady breathing beside her would’ve been enough to have her eyelids drooping too. 

So, now, she’s curled into Becky as well, sat up straighter than Bayley and almost the big spoon, which is always funny to Charlotte because she’s the shortest. 

But, really, it’s super cute and honestly one of Charlotte’s favorite sights, every time it happens, so, before she does anything else, she snaps a picture of the three of them to set as her new lock screen later. 

She makes sure to keep her movements and actions slow and quiet as she goes about setting her things down, and she slips into their room to change into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt before coming back out to the living room.

Her own yawn fights to escape as she walks back down the hall, but she bites it back. 

For a minute, again, she just stands there and watches them. She wonders how she got lucky enough to have all of them, to be able to come home to them like this. 

That overwhelming, overflowing awe in her veins pricks lightly at her eyes in the form of tears, and she has to blink quickly to get them away. She blames her exhaustion for making her more susceptible to emotions. (But maybe it’s also the fact that she hasn’t really gotten to see them all weekend, and she missed them.)

Either way, she thinks she could look at them forever—in the least creepy way possible. But then she glances to the clock on the wall, and sees that it’s 12:23 in the morning, and she concludes that they need to be moved to the bed, because they’ll be super sore in the morning if they aren't. 

She picks Bayley—the heaviest sleeper—up first, cautiously and carefully. She’s the hardest to lift only because of the fact that she’s almost the same height as Charlotte herself, but Charlotte, after a little trial and error in past attempts, found that the easiest way to pick them  _all_  up is to sort of just drape their arms around her neck and wrap their legs around her waist, so even as they don’t offer her much help, she can still support them in one spot. And, usually,  _luckily_ , they tighten their hold around her unconsciously, even through their lack of true awareness.

And, luckily, Bayley does just that presently, so, Charlotte makes it to their room without any complications.

She walks around to the side of the bed furthest from the door and tenderly places Bayley down in her normal spot on the mattress. She manages to loosen the woman’s hold on her and place her arms over her own stomach. 

Bayley makes a soft, tired sound at the slight disturbance, but she doesn’t open her eyes or show any real consciousness. She just snuggles into her pillow a little more. 

Charlotte grins, a bit adoringly, a lot in love, and she leans down to press her lips to Bayley’s temple, long and lingering. Then she heads to the living room again to get Becky and bring her to the same place. 

Becky’s a little clingier in her sleep, so it’s a little more difficult to get her arms to unhook from around Charlotte’s neck once she’s officially started to hang on, but eventually Charlotte succeeds in laying her down on Bayley’s right, closer to the middle of the mattress. 

A low, nonsensical mumble slips past her lips, and Charlotte just tilts her head fondly as the woman’s face contorts with the emotions of her dream.

She’s used to Becky’s sleep talking by now, and since it doesn’t sound distressed, Charlotte just reaches out and moves some stray hair from Becky's forehead before placing the same type of kiss there. Then she goes to take her last trip to the living room. 

Sasha is the easiest to lift and carry; she’s so small in comparison to Charlotte, after all. But the most unexpected truth is that she’s actually the clingiest out of all three of Charlotte’s women.

(Of course, it’s only when they’re in private, that Sasha ever lets herself soften and show feelings other than protectiveness and readiness to fight anyone that hurts her girlfriends.)

Charlotte will never forget the first time Sasha let her exhaustion take hold of her in front of them, because she just dropped her entire front of hardness and indifference and snuggled into Charlotte in the back seat of the car they'd rented, on some trip to another city.

It had truly caught her offguard. The whole friendship thing still felt surreal at times, and, suddenly, Charlotte had her arms full of the one person that was more closed off than her. 

So, “You tired, Boss?” is what she had said lightly, keeping her cool and trying not to return the embrace too eagerly.

She caught Bayley’s eye in the rearview mirror and hid her smile as Becky sent a glance back over her shoulder. 

“Shut up,” Sasha had mumbled into her neck, even as she tightened her hold around her waist. “If any of you tell anyone I'll beat your asses.”

“Sure, Boss,” Charlotte had then nodded dutifully. 

“You got it,” Becky had saluted.

“Yeah, okay,” Bayley didn’t even try to pretend she believed that, which almost made Charlotte laugh. 

But still, they never did mention it to anyone else. (Because why would they?)

And that led to Sasha trusting them more. It led to her more frequently showing her kinder emotions. 

It led to Charlotte knowing, now, to expect that the biggest struggle would be getting Sasha to let go of her. 

And while, usually, as she went to set Sasha down, she could just follow her momentum forward and sleep beside the woman, _today,_ she has to be up in about three hours, while the they have about six more left to cherish; so she doesn’t see why she should disrupt their positioning twice in such a short time span. 

So, as she carefully disengages from the embrace, she begins to withdraw, with the intent to go sleep on the couch.

Which is not a _completely_ uncommon occurrence on these sorts of late nights. She doesn’t want to disturb them further and with such frequency. She doesn’t see the point in getting in her usual spot in the middle of the bed only for her to then have to risk waking them up so she can leave in a few hours. It feels unfair to them.

They’d told her after the first time that they didn’t mind, of course, but she knows that they all get such small amounts of normal sleep, that she kept doing it anyways. 

After about the third time, though, instead of waiting to tell her off about it later, like before, they just ended up migrating to where she was on the couch—a luckily large couch—and wrapped around her until they had to get moving for the day. 

(Becky did end up telling her that they still had to work on her thinking they didn’t miss her as much when she’s not around, because, truly, they’d make any sacrifice to spend time with her.) 

(And Charlotte had definitely not almost cried hearing it. Of course not.)

She did, however, usually wind up staying with them in bed after that, even though she knew she’d feel bad later on. Because Becky was right. She did still need to work on remembering that they missed her just as much as she missed them. It was just a hard habit to kick. 

Sometimes, though, if the timespan between her falling asleep and her waking up truly felt too short to justify, she still went to sleep on the couch. 

And when she does, it mostly happens that Charlotte wakes up first and alone, but, also sometimes, rarer but still often enough to be almost a norm, she wakes up completely surrounded by arms and legs and love. (Because the other thing that Becky said was also true, and they’re always ready to prove it.)

And Charlotte doesn’t mind the first instance, obviously, but she definitely prefers the second one. 

But, seeing as she has to be up in so few hours, and they have longer than that, she knows that’s not what will happen this time. And she’s okay with that. Just a little disappointed, is all. 

So, as a result, she doesn’t manage to catch the sigh that slips past her lips as she goes to press a kiss to Sasha’s hairline. Fortunately it’s faint enough to almost be drowned out by the sound of the fan on the dresser.

In the next few seconds, she’s already pulling away and turning around, so she doesn’t see Sasha blink her eyes open.

She does feel the fingers that latch onto her wrist and hold her in place, though. She tries not to jump at the sensation. 

“Hey,” she whispers softly, with a smile, as she meets Sasha’s sleepy gaze. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Sasha, always fractionally her character, shakes her head. 

“Didn’t wake me. Been up.”

Charlotte gives her an indulgent nod of her head, even as she watches the woman’s eyelids start to droop again.

“Of course. My bad, love.”

Sasha hums in the back of her throat, like the stirring of words that won’t form. She clumsily tugs Charlotte closer, takes her hand and presses two weak kisses to her palm, a familiar, loving gesture she gives to them. 

“C’mere,” she then says, opening her arms. 

“I have to be up again in three hours, honey,” Charlotte tells her. “There’s no reason for me to disturb y’all that many times.”

“Doesn't matter,” Sasha insists, knowing the routine, knowing Charlotte’s thought process. “Three hours with you’s better than three without. Always.”

Charlotte feels herself melt. (Like she could ever really be cold around them.)

She’s a little less torn, but not completely put together, on the idea.

“Oh, if only the world knew how much of a romantic you truly are, Banks,” she murmurs. “We’d have to really fight ‘em off with a kendo stick then, wouldn’t we?”

Sasha shrugs, but it’s too faint of an action to have any effect on the two still sleeping peacefully at her side. 

“Nah,” she breathes out. “Only comes out with you.”

And Charlotte knows “you” means  _them_ , the three of them that Sasha has so softened for over the years. Her smile widens.

“Well, thank goodness for that,” she says.

Sasha makes that same humming sound, and she once again beckons for Charlotte to come closer. 

Charlotte can only find it within herself to resist for a moment more before she’s conceding and closing the space between her and the bed. She’s just too tired tonight to pretend like she doesn’t need them holding her.

“Okay,” she eases onto the mattress quietly. “Alright. Scoot over.”

Sasha does so happily, and, only as she does when she’s tired and completely out of it, she leans into Charlotte and lets herself be small, vulnerable, protected instead of actively protecting. 

Charlotte’s arms curl around her automatically, as a promise, a steady reminder that these moments are okay, that Sasha can be as small and vulnerable as much as she wants, that Charlotte will always protect her, just as Bayley and Becky will. 

“Love you, Baby Flair.”

Charlotte kisses her hairline again.

“Love you too, Sushi.”

Sasha lets out one last amused huff of air through her nose, into Charlotte’s neck, and then she’s presumably gone again, into the world of her dreams.

A moment or two of still quiet passes, and Charlotte is just starting to settle in when there’s the sound of shifting against the sheets. She glances over just in time to see a head of orange hair rise up, on Sasha’s other side. 

Becky’s eyes blink sluggishly and search around for a few moments before landing on where Charlotte’s watching her. 

“Hey, Charlie,” she greets quietly, low and raspy, pleased at the sight of her. “Just get in?”

Charlotte nods. She extends the arm underneath Sasha's neck to offer Becky a gentle caress of the cheek. 

“Yeah. Just a bit ago.”

Becky leans into her touch with a minute grin, a slight lifting of the corner of her mouth; it’s still enough to give Charlotte that same warm sensation in her chest. 

“You got an early start later?”

“Yeah,” Charlotte answers. “Sasha made me stay anyways.”

“Mm, good,” Becky’s grin grows. She cocks her head to the side, and an eyebrow quirks up. “Why does she get all the love though?”

“‘Cause I'm amazing,” Sasha suddenly mumbles, still with her face pressed to Charlotte’s shoulder. “Next question.”

Charlotte keeps her chuckle soft, so as to not wake Bayley, who is still pretty much dead to the world and will be until they have to wake up, probably. (Because unless she's directly shaken awake, once Bayley’s out, she’s out for the rest of the night. At least ninety-eight percent of the time, that is. Just like once Bayley’s awake, she’s truly up and ready to go smile the world’s sadness away. Or, at least,  _their_   _world’s_  sadness, but that’s semantics.)

Becky merely rolls her eyes at Sasha’s response, but it’s fond and familiar with the attitude. 

“Okay, well, we missed Charlotte too, Boss, let her over here.”

Sasha makes a small show of groaning at the movement, but she does end up letting Charlotte climb over her so that she can be settled in between her and Becky, instead, within closer reach of Bayley.

Now, both Sasha and Becky curl into her sides. They wrap their arms around her stomach and place their hands on each other’s hips. 

Becky frowns lightly. 

“Mm, Bay,” she tries to reach back and get Bayley to move closer. 

Charlotte turns her head a little, to look at Bayley’s back that’s turned to them. She manages to reach out just enough to lightly rub a hand across the woman’s right shoulder. 

And, no, it’s not enough to rouse Bayley from her slumber, but it is an action _familiar_ enough to Bayley’s senses to have her turning over instinctively and scooting closer to them. 

As soon as she finds Becky, she immediately latches on—a hugger to the core—and then their little pile is complete. 

Charlotte feels her muscles finally start to relax.

“Y’all are gonna hate me when I have to wake you up so I can leave.”

“Bold of you to assume we’ll let you go now that we’ve got a hold of you,” Becky says.

“And you’re gonna answer to Hunter when he asks questions about why I didn’t show up to the meeting with my dad?”

“Yep, you’re sick,” Sasha replies. “Not feelin’ well after workin’ nonstop all weekend.”

“Gotta rest up for tonight,” Becky continues, shifting her arm back some to trace her fingertips across Bayley’s forearm over her abdomen. “Wouldn’t want to miss a show.”

Charlotte hums.

“Maybe I’ll take your ideas into consideration.”

“Maybe it wasn’t up for discussion.”

This time a breathy chuckle escapes her, but before she can find a response a low and lazy “Shh,” comes from over Becky’s shoulder, close to Becky’s ear.

“S’not good to stay up so late when you don’t feel good, Char,” Bayley mutters, surprising them all. “Let’s go to sleep.”

“Great idea,” Sasha says, entirely too pleased with the fact that they’ve seemingly won the battle. 

“The lady has spoken,” Becky laughs a little.

"Alright, Bay," Charlotte whispers. "Good night."

"G'night."

A few more moments of shifting and settling take place, and then silence falls over them once more, like a comforting blanket. (Though they usually don’t use blankets, because the combined body heat of the four of them is typically enough to spare them as their temperatures drop.)

Charlotte’s tension slowly dissipates entirely. 

She has the fleeting thought, as she drifts to sleep, that she would go through any amount of long days or weekends, as long as it meant she still got to come home to this at the end of it all. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> My Tumblr is Flairfatale.


End file.
